When reading The Zohar, we want to participate in this game, in the scenario that The Zohar tells us about. At this time, the scenario shows the following to us: “Do I want to participate in it?—“Yes. I am interested in participating in this scenario and being a part of it.”
Question: When one plays a role, one usually identifies himself with it. What do I have to identify myself with when I play according to the scenario that is used in The Zohar?
Answer: It is said in the “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot,” Item 155: Therefore we must ask, why then, did the Kabbalists obligate each person (meaning each of us) to study the wisdom of Kabbalah? Indeed, there is a great thing in it, worthy of being publicized: There is a wonderful, invaluable remedy to those who engage in the wisdom of Kabbalah. Although they do not understand what they are learning, through the yearning and the great desire to understand what they are learning, they awaken upon themselves the Lights that surround their souls.
This means that every person from Israel (those who have authentic aspiration to spirituality) is guaranteed to finally attain all the wonderful attainments that the Creator had contemplated in the Thought of Creation to delight every creature. And one who has not been awarded in this life will be granted in the next life, etc., until one is awarded completing His Thought, which He had planned for him.
And while one has not attained perfection (until one has not yet reached the revelations or perceived the life in the upper world), the Lights that are destined to reach him are considered Surrounding Lights. That means that they stand ready for him, but are waiting for him to purify his vessels of reception, at which time these Lights will clothe the able vessels.
This is why we should aspire to and try to get closer to what is described in The Book of Zohar. It doesn’t matter how it is called—a game, an exercise, an exertion, a prayer, MAN—in general, it is about “knowing the subject of one’s studies”, as it is said “and Adam knew Eve, his wife.” “Know” means “merging, uniting.”
Until one merges with spirituality, one has to continue aspiring to it; it is called “the game.” One has to imagine himself being already “there.” If one doesn’t have an aspiration, then it means that he has nothing at all. To the extent of one’s desire to trigger the Light that constantly shines upon us, the Light starts influencing us on a bigger scale because our desire to attain it has been increased. We are the ones who elicit the Light’s actions, whereas the Light is unchangeable. It is our job to enhance our susceptibility to the Light. We visualize the Light more vividly, thus getting a feeling that “we already are “there”: “What is it? How did it happen?” We play the “game of bestowal” and pretend that we are capable of loving others who are already connected to us. Due to the fact that I seem to be there already, the Light of the future shines upon us now.
Question: I strive to be “there.” However, what do The Zohar’s words mean to me in the “scenario”? What is the role of the language of The Zohar?
Answer: It is your future life. So far, these words do not mean a thing to you. What can the authors of The Zohar tell you? Their task is to describe the pictures of the authentic reality.
Spirituality is not the world of bodies, but rather the realm of souls, that is, the desires to bestow that are interconnected with each other. The desires to give make a system of liaisons among them. The degree of their similarity with the Light defines the extent of the Light’s presence in them.
What is this entire “performance” about? Each of us (as a soul), a desire to bestow, is already a particle of the interactive network; all of us are parts of the corrected humanity that we still strive to reveal. It does exist! All we have to do is divulge it. The end of correction (Gmar Tikkun), the third state, does exist!
So, we have to imagine ourselves being in a corrected state and pretend as if we are there already; this is how we implement our desire to reach it. Our aspiration to be there makes us feel that we have already achieved the goal and that we are already “there.” In other words, our aspiration equalizes with the desire to “know” the subject of our studies, to merge with it and dress in it. We don’t know what it is, but it is about us and our internal state, our eternal inner essence rather than our mortal bodies. We want to reveal it and live in it.
Our eternal essence does exist, but our minds have not merged with it yet. We want to connect with it, get inside it, as if one has a dress that hangs in the wardrobe and really wants to put it on. If it so happens, one will live within one’s eternal essence, since our clothing reflects who we are.
In our material clothes, we can only stay in this earthly realm. When one clothes oneself into this “dress,” that is, into the Light of bestowal, Bina, Hassadim, one reaches the future world.
Let this fairy tale hit our imagination. That’s all there is to it.
[89947]
From the 2nd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/10/12, The Zohar
Related Material:
On The Wave Of The Book Of Zohar
Who Are You, Authors Of The Zohar?
Yearning To Meet The Light
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When we begin to read The Book of Zohar we should notice two lines everywhere. But where? And should I evoke the left line?
